Biography
Hannah Lew channels her vision through Cold Beat, merging austere arrangements that bridge coldwave and post-punk with emotionally resonant compositions. Early efforts addressed expansive themes, as the 2014 release Over Me found the singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist confronting her father's passing along with broader experiences of absence through taut, propulsive tracks evoking Tubeway Army, Blondie, and the Sound—the latter's track "Cold Beat" supplying the project's title. Rapid transformation of her native San Francisco amid the technology surge shaped 2015's Into the Air, incorporating jangly indie pop, motorik rhythms, and minimal synth explorations into her palette. Electronic facets later dominated the refined and wide-ranging Mother from 2020, which echoed Eurythmics while addressing Lew's experience of motherhood, and extended into the contemplative War Garden issued the next year.
Lew initiated Cold Beat material in the late 2000s amid her tenure with the noted San Francisco trio Grass Widow and her parallel work as a filmmaker and visual artist. Following the group's pause after 2012's Internal Logic, she devoted full attention to the project. She convened Neon Piss guitarist Kyle King, Shannon & the Clams guitarist and synth player Cody Blanchard, and former Grass Widow drummer Lillian Maring to capture November 2013's Worms/Year 5772, whose songs examined her father's death and her struggles with insomnia. Issued as the debut on her own Crime on the Moon imprint, the set included remixes from POW! and Total Control's Mikey Young, initiating an enduring collaborative bond. Lew sustained her reflections on mourning through Cold Beat's debut album-length statement, July 2014's Over Me. Engineered by Trans Am's Phil Manley and handled for mixing and mastering by Young, the recording featured support from King and Erase Errata drummer Bianca Sparta.
The ensemble and its sonic approach shifted rapidly thereafter. Slightly more than a year following Over Me, the group delivered September 2015's Into the Air, which enlisted drummer Susi Leni and guitarist Jackson Blumgart alongside Lew and King. Influenced in part by San Francisco's swift gentrification driven by the technology expansion, the album emphasized electronic textures that guided subsequent Cold Beat works. Lew composed and tracked most of the more personal 2017 album Chaos by Invitation independently before enlisting Manley, Young, King, and Blumgart for further contributions. In August 2018, Cold Beat issued A Simple Reflection, an EP of Eurythmics covers that broadened the configuration to encompass King, guitarist Sean Monaghan, and keyboardist Luciano Talpini Aita. The EP's rich, synth-centric approach established the foundation for the band's fourth album. Mother, shaped by Lew's pregnancy and the era's global upheaval, appeared via DFA in February 2020. One year afterward, the Double Sided Mirror Remix EP presented reinterpretations of a Mother selection by Cabaret Voltaire's Stephen Mallinder and Cooper Saver. Captured over Zoom amid the COVID-19 global pandemic, September 2021's War Garden sustained Cold Beat's increasingly dance-oriented trajectory while contemplating absence, distance, and endurance.
Lew initiated Cold Beat material in the late 2000s amid her tenure with the noted San Francisco trio Grass Widow and her parallel work as a filmmaker and visual artist. Following the group's pause after 2012's Internal Logic, she devoted full attention to the project. She convened Neon Piss guitarist Kyle King, Shannon & the Clams guitarist and synth player Cody Blanchard, and former Grass Widow drummer Lillian Maring to capture November 2013's Worms/Year 5772, whose songs examined her father's death and her struggles with insomnia. Issued as the debut on her own Crime on the Moon imprint, the set included remixes from POW! and Total Control's Mikey Young, initiating an enduring collaborative bond. Lew sustained her reflections on mourning through Cold Beat's debut album-length statement, July 2014's Over Me. Engineered by Trans Am's Phil Manley and handled for mixing and mastering by Young, the recording featured support from King and Erase Errata drummer Bianca Sparta.
The ensemble and its sonic approach shifted rapidly thereafter. Slightly more than a year following Over Me, the group delivered September 2015's Into the Air, which enlisted drummer Susi Leni and guitarist Jackson Blumgart alongside Lew and King. Influenced in part by San Francisco's swift gentrification driven by the technology expansion, the album emphasized electronic textures that guided subsequent Cold Beat works. Lew composed and tracked most of the more personal 2017 album Chaos by Invitation independently before enlisting Manley, Young, King, and Blumgart for further contributions. In August 2018, Cold Beat issued A Simple Reflection, an EP of Eurythmics covers that broadened the configuration to encompass King, guitarist Sean Monaghan, and keyboardist Luciano Talpini Aita. The EP's rich, synth-centric approach established the foundation for the band's fourth album. Mother, shaped by Lew's pregnancy and the era's global upheaval, appeared via DFA in February 2020. One year afterward, the Double Sided Mirror Remix EP presented reinterpretations of a Mother selection by Cabaret Voltaire's Stephen Mallinder and Cooper Saver. Captured over Zoom amid the COVID-19 global pandemic, September 2021's War Garden sustained Cold Beat's increasingly dance-oriented trajectory while contemplating absence, distance, and endurance.
Albums
SKY, Vol. 10
2025
SKY, Vol. 8
2025
WAR GARDEN
2021
Mother
2020
Chaos by Invitation
2017
Into the Air
2015
Worms / Year 5772
2013
Singles
